Arcana Creatures™
@nabesthetics asked for people to share their creatures in the Arcana universe and I have a Lot that I'm taking full advantage of this so thank you <3
I created a ton of personal worldbuilding lore for the Arcana back in the day, all of which can be found here but this post is just for all my various Creatures!
I'm going to separate them into categories, Creatures as in Animals, Creatures as in the Supernatural, and Creatures as in ???
This will be long so it's all going under a Read More lol
Creatures as in Animals
Sirens
In my worldbuilding, I carved a strait from the Salty Sea to the Sea of Persephia, and within that strait are sirens!
However, these sirens are much less humanoid than you might be used to from common depictions, and while they can look human-ish, they function purely as animals, much like a pack of sharks (or orcas, really)
They still have typical siren abilities, and lure stray fishers and pirates to their deaths, but they use illusion magic in their songs to show their victims either their wildest fantasy, most horrible fear, or best kept secret. Whatever has the strongest pull on their victim!
Within the strait, there are two main groups of sirens, each living mostly at either end of the strait, avoiding the middle, where the human towns are. However, whenever there is a blood moon, the two groups meet in the middle of the strait for a full-out, horrifically bloody brawl that only ends once the sun rises in the morning.
Lindworms
In my worldbuilding, lindworms live far South, among the Southern Spines mountains (which I call the Snowcap Mountains), and though they used to be much greater in numbers, all of the tribes in the South (including Lucio/Morga's tribe) still have frequent encounters with them along with the canon muskbears.
In my OC lore, Meredith Gwynsdottir's (the Pirate Queen) father was killed by a lindworm protecting her, and the scar across her face is from the same attack.
Lindworms are generally solitary creatures, living deep within the cave systems of the mountains, but they do hunt above ground, feeding on medium to large sized animals such as deer, wolves, bears, and occasionally humans.
They have almost neon-blue blood and razor sharp scales, especially along their tail, which is where most injuries tend to come from due to their surprising speed.
Dragons
Right now, this is a smaller category, as dragons haven't been seen in centuries. However, Ambrose Calamity, the person in charge of Plutos, my pirate island, has a pet dragon very few know about, named Jaspar!
Ambrose found his egg years ago, and though it was considered a dud-egg, he helped it hatch through magic, and Jaspar was born.
Jaspar is currently the size of a house cat, and likes to sit on Ambrose's shoulders! It's unclear how big he will get eventually, but it was rumored that dragons lived for centuries, so only time will tell!
Creatures as in Supernatural
Vampires
Currently I have two major vampires that feature in my Arcana-verse, Marjorie and Lamprey!
Both of them are pirates, though members of different crews and with vastly different backgrounds/motivations.
Marjorie (or Marjie/Marj for short) is currently the main cook on the Pirate Queen's ship, the Jagged Ruby. She was traveling with a previous Queen centuries ago, when both she and her lover fell into the Strait of Sirens. Saoirse (more on them later) managed to pull Marjorie from the sirens, and as she lay bleeding to death, another crew member, who was a vampire, turned her, "saving" her. As her lover did not survive, Marjorie resented Saoirse for many years for pulling her from the waters, but has since made relative peace with her immortality, and decided to stay on as part of the Queen's crew. She's abrasive but has a soft spot for the current Queen, Meredith.
Lamprey, on the other hand, is currently a member of Captain Sydney Aloisio De Luca's crew (Syd for short) of bounty hunters. She's a relatively young vampire, only 150 years old, and was turned at 25 while studying at the Sea Palace (an ancient institution that houses all of the world's knowledge). She joined Syd voluntarily, looking for something "fun" to do since she couldn't continue to study, and specializes in stealth missions.
Both of them have the usual vampiric afflictions, can't go out in the sun, but with varying degrees of severity. They can both ingest garlic, but it's similar to a lactose intolerant person having dairy and suffering with the consequences later.
Marjorie is fed by voluntary donations from the crew, and/or participating during raids and feeding from other crews, but she doesn't usually kill anyone. Lamprey goes to feed whenever she wants, and does get carried away often, but she is prohibited from turning anyone else into a vampire via her contract with Syd.
Were-creatures
Right now I have two were-creatures, Rhys, a were-coyote, and his sister, Hyena, a (you guessed it) were-hyena.
They are from a town deep in the Bulan Mountains full of many different were-species.
Rhys is older by a few years, but the much more docile of the two, and during one of their first transformations as teens, Hyena almost killed him, scaring and wounding him enough to run away from home. He ended up in Venterre, where he works in the D'Oria vineyards after meeting Alec (my apprentice) and is a bit of a himbo.
Hyena stayed in her village for a few more years, but grew more and more restless and feral by the day, until she met and almost killed (there's a theme) Syd. He was impressed enough by her strength and abilities to offer a job to her on his ship, and she agreed, eager to get away. On Syd's ship, all of the crew go by animal-themed nicknames, hence Lamprey and Hyena (and there will be more).
Not much is known about the village they come from! (as in, I haven't done much with it LMAO)
Demons
Arcana canon has a good number of demons like the courtiers, and I love adding to that! I have a handful of demons that are lore-important but only one named so far.
Margay is another member of Syd's nightmare crew, and he is a relatively young demon, at least younger than the courtiers, but still very old compared to humans.
His human form is that of a young child, which is frequently used to lure victims into traps (and also because he finds it funny to be a small child torturing people)
The contract forged for him to serve as part of Syd's crew had to be completely airtight as Margay loves looking for loopholes and extorting them to his benefit
Extremely coercive, manipulative, and is always looking for a way to entertain himself
Pictures below are of Margay's human/true form
Two other demons that are lore-important but unnamed are the demons Hideko (Syd's quartermaster) and Drago Fortunado made deals with.
The demon Hideko made a deal with heightened her senses like hearing and smell, but also manifests as dozens of red eyes that appear anywhere along her skin, allowing her to see in 360-degrees at any time.
The demon Drago Fortunado made a deal with was to save Syd's life, and in exchange, Syd stopped aging, but he has to harvest hearts for the demon on a frequent schedule to keep from dying. His demon is extremely old, and very powerful, but rarely manifests aside from the smell of magnolias.
Gharial
Yet another member of Syd's crew, and they get their own subcategory because there's yet to be anything like them!
They are a siren/human hybrid, the first of their kind, created by magicians at the Sea Palace from a captured siren.
Can't charm people in the same way sirens do, but they still have powerful vocal magic like sending supersonic waves through water to disrupt other ships, and they spend a majority of their time in water as their skin dries out very easily otherwise.
They are not recognized by other sirens as being one of them, and they are very obviously not human, so they distinctly fall into the "other" category, which they don't mind.
Their contract with Syd states that they can't eat the other crew members, though they still do try.
Creatures as in ???
Saoirse/The Pirate Queen's Quartermaster
Saoirse gets their own category as no one is quite sure what they are. Many refer to them as a demon, or an entity, and some cultures have stories about them as a god. Saoirse would say they're none of those things.
They are unimaginably old, existing before humanity, when demons and magical beings were pretty much the only creatures alive. They're incomprehensibly powerful, and shaped much of the world as it is currently.
Due to their power, the majority of the demons of the time rose together to trap Saoirse in an icy prison at the end of the world, where they were forced to remain for thousands of years. That is, until Niamh, the original Pirate Queen, ventured to the end of the world to strike a deal with Saoirse, simultaneously freeing them from their prison as long as they acted as the Quartermaster for the Queen for as long as the role exists. And it has, for hundreds and hundreds of years.
Saoirse has a human form that they modeled after Niamh, just adjusted slightly over the years. To most humans, if you stare at them for long enough, it's easy to tell they're not quite human. All demons know who they are at first glance, and as such are often terrified of them, especially if they participated in Saoirse's imprisonment (like Syd's demon and in my canon, Valdemar).
They adore humans though, and have become more human-like over the centuries they've spent serving the Queen.
Their true form is impossible to accurately perceive, especially by humans, but can be described as a blue-black void with piercing eyes.
They operate between planes of existence, and pass through the magical realms with the same ease as one opens a door. They can teleport across the map within moments, though they rarely do so as to not leave the Queen defenseless.
Their full bio can be found here, but this is the quick summary of them!
That's my list of Creatures I have so far! Anyone is welcome to borrow them for anything, just ask first, but I love talking about my freaks (lovingly)